


Love in Question: 10 Times Clint Asked Phil to Marry Him (Kinda), and 1 Time Phil Asked Clint

by BeneficialAddiction



Series: Boxers, Briefs, and Other Shorts [21]
Category: Hawkeye (Comics), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Falling In Love, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Marriage Proposal, Tumblr: imagineclintcoulson, guest writer, ten and one
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-03
Updated: 2017-11-03
Packaged: 2019-01-29 03:46:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,134
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12622476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BeneficialAddiction/pseuds/BeneficialAddiction
Summary: Anonymous requested:Tony flippantly asks "when's the wedding?" Clint shyly avoids both the question and Tony's gaze. Until Phil returns "We haven't set a date yet." Then Clint is watching Phil for the smallest tell...





	Love in Question: 10 Times Clint Asked Phil to Marry Him (Kinda), and 1 Time Phil Asked Clint

**I.**

The suit puts a bullet in him.

One shot to the outer thigh, just above the knee, a clean through-and-through.

He and his team have been tracking Clint since Shanghai, following him across the continent to Serbia. At first he'd thought they were there to put a hit on him, hired by one of his enemies from the dark net, but he'd quickly discarded that idea. There were too many of them to be working for a rival boss or mercenary, and they were far too regimented for the scramblings of the underworld. Crossing out that possibility, his next idea is some alphabet soup agency, but they're too organized, too skilled for your average FBI or CIA. He can’t decide _who_ these guys are, but the fact that they manage to keep up...He's impressed.

That the suit manages to hit him at all – let alone cripple him without seriously injuring him – while hauling ass at a dead run across a rough, uneven rooftop, deadly hot sun beating down and kicking up a glare off the black-tar...

Well that's hella sexy.

Clint's got a thing for good shots, ok?

Curling in on himself as his leg gives out beneath him, he executes a neat tumble that saves him from cracking his chin against the concrete and brings him up in a crouch, teeth clenched against the pain and hands already moving to try to stop the flow of blood pouring from the neat little hole in his thigh. His heart hammers as the suit approaches, closer and closer, but he could've killed Clint seven strides ago so it must be prison right? That leaves him plenty of chances to escape – especially when they'll need to send him to medical first.

He can bide his time.

He's thinking too fast, a sure sign that he's fighting back panic, but then the suit is standing over him, holstering his gun and shooting his cuffs, and Clint actually snorts because hell, he's one smooth customer isn't he?

"Mr. Barton," he says calmly, removing his aviators and revealing the bluest pair of eyes Clint has ever seen, "My name is Phil Coulson; I'm an Agent of the Strategic Homeland Intervention Enforcement and Logistics Division."

"Woof, that's a mouthful," he says cockily, pasting a smirk onto his face. "Compensating for something there, Agent?"

"I'll leave that for you to determine," the man replies in a perfect deadpan, but Clint swears he can see a grin tugging at the edge of his mouth. "For now, I have a proposition for you."

"Why Agent, I'm flattered," Clint exclaims, fluttering his eyelashes and slapping one blood-covered hand over his heart. "Bit forward – we _have_ only just met – but you sure do fill out that suit awful nice."

The man cocks an eyebrow, looks unimpressed, and Clint, because he's an idiot who's mouth isn't connected to his brain half the time, keeps right on going.

"You wanna get hitched, I won't say no," he continues, pushing to his feet even though it sends pain shooting through his leg, the sound of a chopper approaching loud against his eardrums. "You look like the kinda guy that can keep up, once you get past the average G-man thing you've got going on."

The man sighs heavily through his nose, puts his sunglasses back on, but Clint's pretty sure he catches him rolling his eyes just before. He's not surprised at all when he completely ignores his flirtations, but he _is_ surprised when the guy catches him under the arm when he stumbles, keeping him mostly upright.

"Come with me," he says, like he truly believes Clint could still up and bolt on him, even as the chopper comes into view and makes to set down on the rooftop. "You're wasted here, when you could be making a difference with us."

He sounds off balance, like this isn't his normal speech, like he's trying to get it all out there as quickly as he possibly can, and that more than anything gives Clint pause.

"Food, shelter, medical, a team to bring you home," he urges, his grip tight around Clint's upper arm, his eyes intent on him behind his shades. "You're better than this Barton. Come with me."

"Yeah," Clint says, before he knows he's going to, nodding as the whup of the chopper blades attempts to drown out his words. "Yeah, ok. But I'm going to medical first – some asshole in a swanky suit shot me."

This time Coulson does grin, sharp and wicked like a shark.

**II.**

It's been nearly eight months since Clint was recruited to SHIELD, and he hasn't settled easily.

Oh he got through the training just fine, the physical parts at least, excelling in multiple styles of hand-to-hand and shattering every record ever held on the range. He even does ok in the other bits, better than he thought he would anyway. He struggles in a lot of his more... _intellectual classes,_ but if he shuts his mouth and tries he can usually find a teacher willing to help him out a bit in his problem areas.

Mostly it's social type stuff he's having an issue with. He hasn't made many friends here. He was nervous coming in – this set up isn't anything like he's ever experienced before, and he's used to looking out for number one. He's sure he made some enemies the very first week, what with the way he'd acted; suspicious, paranoid, loud-mouthed and cocky as a defense. Even now, having calmed a bit, found a little space to breathe where he thinks that maybe he _can_ trust it's still hard, and not everyone likes the way he operates.

He's constantly asking questions. Picking at missions plans. Pointing out flaws and making claims about his skills that, while true, sound like bragging. He's labeled by a few as stupid, more as combative, nearly all as having a serious problem with authority, and it's only funny because it doesn't seem like anyone, in an organization full of spies, can see through it.

He's pushing buttons.

Testing boundaries.

Finding the cracks, pressing at sore spots, waiting for them to turn on him or worse.

He's metaphorically scanning his exits, and yet not a single agent seems to realize it.

At least by now he's doing it seven/ten in favor of curiosity over fear, interest over mistrust. He is settling, slowly and with great difficulty, yes, but settling. SHEILD isn't a terrible place to be, and he's even found people he probably _could_ make friends with given a little time and effort. Mostly it's the handlers he has issues with, and really that only seems fair given that they have so many issues with him.

Sad though.

They're the senior agents, supposedly the best of the best within the organization, and yet none of them have figured him out yet, none of them have cracked the code of how to work with the infamous junior Clint Barton. Pity, he thinks it would be... nice, to have a handler willing to keep him on for more than one op, who understands how he works and what he needs to fully click into his place on a team, to be a part.

He thinks Coulson could probably figure it out.

As he packs for a three-day milk run to Venezuela, Clint rolls his eyes, stuffing his gear into his go-bag.

Stupid - he hasn't seen anything of Coulson since the man had picked him up and stuffed him onto that plane in Serbia, though not for lack of looking. It's almost like the guy had disappeared, like he'd never existed at all. If anything he seems to be more of a ghost than a real agent, a living SHIELD legend whose name was mentioned with either solid respect or skeptical disbelief.

_Agent Coulson is an android created by Director Fury himself to be the perfect agent._

_Agent Coulson is an alien from the future, here to help prevent the destruction of the human race._

_Agent Coulson once took out an entire Columbian drug ring on his own with only a paperclip, his tie, and a wild alpaca._

Clint believes none of it and all of it, collecting the stories like a magpie collects shiny bits of tin.

The tales themselves he takes with a hefty grain of salt, but the sentiment behind them?

He absolutely believes that Coulson is that big of a badass, all wrapped up in a swanky suit and a _please-underestimate-me-so-I-can-destroy-you_ front.

But he has things to do and places to be, so for now he puts all thought of his recruiting agent out of his mind. The flight to South America is blessedly short, probably because Clint sleeps like the dead on any kind of flight. They'd been briefed well before they were deployed, so he knows exactly where he needs to be and what he needs to do. As Secondary, the team is being sent in to play backup for the agents on the ground, hopefully unnecessary but available if things go south. Clint is to play eyes-up-high, relaying information to the rest of the grunts as well as their handler Agent Perez.

Easy enough right?

Yeah.

He may only be a Level Two junior, but even he knows that nothing is ever as easy as it looks.

Things go belly-up in a spectacular display of gunfire, Clint catching and relaying the warning signs just before the shit hits the fan. Abandoning his post on the fly to the displeased snarls of his teammates, he hauls ass across the compound and shimmies his way up an abandoned look-out's post, wriggling his way up onto the roof. Once there, he patches himself into Primary Team's frequency and taps his access code through the comm.

"Alpha Team Leader, you're about to have company," he warns, and then an explosion rocks the east side of the compound, debris cascading down like shrapnel. _"Shit._ Hostiles converging on the south-eastern wall, second story hallway is clear to the northern side of the building."

"I guess we're going south-east then."

Clint blinks, shocked as that smooth, cool, unruffled-under-pressure deadpan comes across his comm, relief and surprise, and as fucked up as it is, delight.

"I got eyes up high Coulson," he says around a grin. "What do you need."

"A path to the detonation point," the man grits out, and that Clint can do.

He listens silently while Coulson rallies his troops, coordinating with Perez to send the rest of Secondary Team swarming in. When he clicks back over to Clint's comm line, he's ready with directions. Guiding him through the melee toward the point of the blast, he reroutes the senior agent twice in a quick but circuitous path to his destination point, everything going smooth right up until it doesn't.

"Incoming, hostiles on your six," he growls, swinging himself off the roof and hustling along the catwalk around the edge of the compound. "Coulson move."

He does, just, not the way Clint expects.

He's got a clear view through the blown-up side of the building into the hallway where five hostiles are converging on Coulson's location. He expects the man to drop or slip around the corner, to get the hell out of the way and let the sniper do his job, but instead, he turns on his heel and does damage.

Unloading what's left of his clip into the first three drug runners that attempt to bum rush him with all the finesse of a bulldozer, he tosses the empty weapon aside and takes the remaining two to task, kicking their asses in a way that Clint hasn't seen anyone do in years. The slick bastard makes it look easy, makes it look _fun,_ and by the time he stands panting in the middle of a pile of dead and unconscious bad guys, Clint is hard in his pants and practically hanging off the edge of the rickety structure he's perched on to get a better view.

"Fuck," he huffs, and Coulson's head snaps up, eyes searching, just in time for Clint to realize that he's still on an open line to the other agent's comm.

Lucky for him, Bad Guy Number Six (who he hadn't even clocked, shit) decides to make an appearance at just that moment and give him a perfect excuse.

"Duck," he says, no more warning than that, and Coulson hits the floor just in time for an arrow to go whizzing past him and bury itself in Number Six's chest.

Coulson lifts his head, looks around, stands and dusts of his knees before tossing a salute in Clint's general direction.

"Thanks for the assist," he says dryly, though there's honesty there too.

Clint snorts.

"Don't think you needed it Sir," he replies, and if Coulson notes the honorific that Clint has refused to use with any other handler thus far, he doesn't mention it. "You are one badass motherfucker Coulson. That was probably the hottest thing I've ever seen."

He doesn't mean to say it but he does, and he can't take it back, so he does what he always does and puts on his cocky swagger, grins into the words like nothing can break him and leaves the awkwardness to third parties. He's curious anyway, still picking away at SHIELD's inner structure, wondering just how handlers do these things, exactly how much personal attention senior agents pay to their assets. It wouldn't be the first time Clint's seen something like that, wouldn't even be the worst thing in the world, and hey, if it helps him find out which way Coulson swings in the meantime, so much the better.

Anyway it's a tried and true technique, even if he expects Coulson to just shrug it off, maybe make a crack about Clint's standards being low, or his kinks more than a little fucked up.

What he does say Clint doesn't expect at all.

"Army Rangers do it good," he purrs, smug and self-satisfied as he looks at the carnage scattered about his feet, and Clint feels his grin slip right off his face.

"Army Ran..." he whimpers, unashamed of the sunburst of arousal that flashes through his belly. "Fuck, you _trying_ to make me come in my pants?"

He doesn't mean to say that either.

Coulson just chuckles.

"Hair trigger much Specialist?" he asks, and Clint gulps because _christ_ this man is smooth.

"You could always marry me and find out," he teases, collecting his melted brain up out of the puddle it's oozed into, surprised but unreasonably happy with the way this insane conversation is going. "Come on Coulson, you know you're dying to be the one to figure out what it takes to finally shut me up. Hell, you'd be a SHIELD legend for that alone."

"I don't kiss and tell," he says seriously, now carefully picking his way over the pile of bodies to get to the safe in the corner.

"Gentleman in the streets, Ranger in the sheets?" Clint asks.

"Something like that. Nice shot by the way. We'll have to send you out with the bow more often."

"Oh god, stop! I still have to climb down."

**III.**

"Clint?"

Clint startles, but doesn't wobble an inch where he's standing on the narrow ledge surrounding the roof of SHIELD's New York headquarters, Coulson's calm, steady voice breaking the dull thrum of city silence. He's been up here for hours after his latest dressing-down by Agent Simmons; a small, diminutive woman whose attitude didn't quite make up for her lack of height.

He'd had a hard time not giggling as she'd berated him in her office for his lack of professionalism over the comms.

Bored, restless after she'd revoked his range access, he'd picked the lock on the rooftop exit and decided it was as good a place as any to get some fresh air. It's cool and damp this early in April, the air clean and the sky clear after a recent rain, and this high up he can see practically all the way to the city limits, where the noise and rush and lights give way to the darker, more quiet places of the mid-suburbia. It's a beautiful night, and there's a need in him to be out and moving, the old roustabout urges whispering in his heart.

It hadn't been an _awful_ op. No casualties, mission goals all met. That was mostly thanks to him. He'd gone against orders once again to bring his fellow agents back tonight, earning him Simmons' tirade about disrespect for authority and inability to follow orders, but that was fine, par for his course here at SHIELD. He doesn't really care. He still has yet to meet a handler who has earned his respect other than the man who's just appeared out of the stairwell, startling him out of his solitary thoughts. 

"Hey Coulson," he greets casually, glancing back over his shoulder, only to be startled by how pale the senior agent appears, how tense. "What are you doing up here?"

"Looking for you," he explains, his hands open and out to his sides as he slowly takes a measured step forward. "I'm glad I was Clint."

Clint blinks, surprised.

So far it's been Barton, or Agent, or Hawkeye, never Clint.

It makes him nervous, as does the way Coulson is slowly sidling closer, and he narrows his eyes, leans away, his boots shuffling along the ledge to compensate for his shift in balance.

"Clint listen to me," Coulson says suddenly, just the hint of an edge in his voice, his _obey-me-if-you-want-to-live_ voice. "Whatever this is? Whatever is going on inside your head right now? We can fix ok?"

Clint stares, baffled as a heavy silence stretches between them for the space or a heartbeat, two.

"What?"

"I'll _help_ Clint," Coulson insists, taking another careful step forward. "Whatever you need. Just... could you come down from there for me? Please? Just come back down and we'll talk."

Clint tilts his head, then confusion gives way to horror as he catches Coulson flicking a glance over the edge of the safety barrier he's currently balanced on, calculating the distance between them. He feels his eyes widen and he looks comically back and forth between the man standing beside him and the expanse of the city spread out twenty stories below, his stomach sinking like a stone to land somewhere around the soles of his boots.

"Wait, did you... I mean, you thought...?"

Jumping easily down off the barrier, he hardly registers the older man's sigh of relief before he's got his arms wrapped tight around him, curling close in a warm, full-bodied hug. It's a testament to how worried Coulson must have been that he doesn't even tense up at this uncharacteristic display of affection, this abrupt and probably inappropriate physical contact. He just hugs Clint right back, his hands fisting in the material of his t-shirt at the base of his spine.

"Jesus Boss, no," he murmurs, clutching the man tight. "I wouldn't do that ok? It's not what it looked like."

"Didn't look good Specialist," the man replies, an attempt at his customary deadpan that misses by a mile, instead coming out tight and choked.

Clint chuckles, can't help it, because really, he's not sure if he's offended or touched.

Letting go, he takes a step back, returns to the railing that circles the roof and sits down on it, swinging his feet over the side to dangle over the empty air. Grinning like a smartass because it's his default setting, he pats the ledge next to him and hopes Coulson will take the invitation. He does, but he doesn't look happy about it, sitting down sideways with his feet safely on the roof, positioned to reach out and snag Clint's wrist at the slightest provocation.

Clint just chuckles, shakes his head in amusement.

"I like high places," he says quietly, staring out over the city. "Can always see so much more from up here."

"A good place for a sniper," Coulson allows carefully, and this time Clint out-and-out laughs.

"Sure," he replies, "But it's calmer too. Quiet. Spend so much time trying to make the world a better place, I figure every once in a while I ought to stop and actually _look_ at it. Appreciate the parts that aren't so bad."

Coulson's answer is a minute coming.

"It _is_ beautiful."

"Yeah," he sighs. Then, because he really shouldn't, "You know I used to be afraid of heights. Got shoved down one too many sets of stairs as a kid. Then when I was thirteen, at Carson's, the acrobats took me up on the highwire, showed me how to fly."

Clint feels a stupid, sappy smile spread across his face, can't bring himself to care.

"They taught me that nobody ever really got hurt by falling," he explains, his fondness for the Antonelli twins bleeding through across years of faded memory. "It's only the landing you have to worry about."

Coulson is quiet for a moment, lifts his hand as if to take Clint's, then drops it back to his thigh.

"You have people to catch you now Clint," he says quietly. "Back there, with Simmons... that wasn't right. I've submitted the paperwork to Director Fury; I'll be your only handler going forward. I won't let you fall."

Clint's heart thumps in his chest and he stares, swamped by so many mixed emotions he doesn't know which one he's actually feeling. All he really knows is that it hurts something small and vulnerable deep inside his chest, aches like a broken rib.

"Marry me."

It's not the first time he's said it but it's the first time he's been ashamed of asking, the first time the words have felt cheap in his mouth. It's the first time he's _scared_ of saying it, because it's the first time he thinks he means it, the first time he thinks that it's maybe something he really _does_ want, for all the wrong reasons.

But Coulson, Phil _fucking_ Coulson, as always knows just what to say.

"No need," he murmurs, getting to his feet and casually brushing off his slacks. He pauses, hesitates, then finally does drop his hand to Clint's shoulder and gives it a squeeze. "I will _always_ come for you."

He turns away, heads for the stairs, and Clint can't swallow his heart down out of his throat before the man is gone again, disappearing through the door into the dark.

**IV.**

Coulson is true to his word and the very next day the paperwork comes through Clint's inbox informing him of his permanent reassignment. It takes less than a dozen missions for him to be made Level Three and become one of the most efficient and widely skilled agents in the organization, even fewer than that for Coulson to earn his whole-hearted trust and unwavering loyalty.

His perceived change in attitude earns him the nickname _Coulson's Bitch,_ right around the time he's given permission to take his own personal weapons into the field. Clint doesn't really give a damn either way – he's been seen as a lot worse things – and besides, being Coulson's bitch is not without its perks. The man takes one look at his applied math scores and sends him to flight school to learn how to pilot the quinjets, staying late to help him with the homework. When Clint sacrifices his bow (and his ankle) pulling a bunch of juniors' asses out of the fire, he sends him down to R and D on his crutches with a permission slip authorizing them to build him a brand new one just as he wants it. He's fair and constructive with his criticism and effusive with his praise, which never fails to make Clint weak at the knees.

It's stupid, what he's doing, letting himself fall for his handler like this.

Coulson had made it crystal clear to all three agents who'd approached him during Clint's time (what – he isn't _counting!_ ) that a relationship between handler and asset was a liability, between senior and junior inappropriate – an abuse of power he simply could not condone.

Oh, there aren't any _real_ frat regs forbidding it – SHIELD expects its agents to be mature adults, to keep the personal and the professional separate – but he's never seen Coulson show real interest in much of anything besides his car, his spy toys, and his old Captain America cars. True to the Ranger he is he can make a raunchy sex joke with the best of them, but it's always in that dry, deadpan tone that makes Clint want to laugh and cry at the same time.

He's never met a man who's harder to read than Senior Agent Phillip J Coulson.

Take now for example.

The man has just spent the last hour reading him the riot act for jumping off another building, into freezing water no less, and now he...

Now he's _taking care_ of him.

Granted, Clint's running one hell of a fever and is a little loopy from the swan dive he'd taken through a window into the damned Thames, but still, mixed signals much?

"Stop that!" Coulson scolds, half frustration, half concern, and Clint's muddled brain doesn't understand until the man reaches up and uses his thumb to smooth out the frown lines between his eyes. "You're thinking too hard – you're just going to make your headache worse."

He doesn't ask how Coulson knows he has a headache.

It's Coulson – of course he knows. 

Instead he just curls himself up tighter, hunches inside the blanket Coulson had wrapped around his shoulders.

He hadn't realized the full extent of Coulson's mother-hen tendencies before this. After fishing him out of the frozen river he'd stuffed Clint into his own heavy, down jacket and bundled him into an SUV, leaving the rest of their team to do the clean-up and breaking three traffic laws getting them back to their posh little London hotel. By the time they'd gotten there Clint's teeth had been chattering so hard he couldn't even curse, his fingers so numb he couldn't even fumble his way out of his clothes.

He'd subsequently been stripped with a brusque efficiency by his boss and object of his undying affections. Not his finest moment – that water was cold ok? Not even his burning embarrassment had been enough to warm him up. After bullying him into a scalding shower, Coulson had toweled him down like he was drying a rambunctious puppy out of a bath, then forced him into no less than three layers of clothing, one of which was the man's very own Rangers hoodie.

Clint is absolutely not squealing like a cheerleader who's been given the quarterback's jersey, thank you very much.

After turning him into a human burrito with the quilts from both double beds, he'd stuck him on the couch (settee?) and crouched down in front of the hearth to build a fire - because of course a London hotel would have a fireplace - but Clint had been a little too busy staring at the way Coulson's slacks stretched across his ass to really pay attention to the man's tirade.

Now he's got Clint's cheek in his palm and Clint can do little else but turn into it, dumbly seeking out the comfort and the warmth he's offered.

Coulson licks his lips then huffs, with what Clint will be calling fond exasperation, then shakes his head and straightens up.

"Stay here," he orders, clicking on the television and turning it onto a channel full of colorful children's cartoons. "Try to keep awake."

Clint nods his agreement but immediately begins to feel himself drift off as Coulson disappears into the little kitchenette. Hard not to, when he feels warm and safe and cared for, more so than he ever has before.

He must catnap a little despite his best efforts, because the next thing he knows Coulson is shaking his shoulder gently, a cup of soup in his free hand. Clint's stomach is instantly awake and makes its demands known, clamoring for something hot, but his hands don't seem to be as enthusiastic. Coulson has to untangle them from the blankets himself, massage his stiff fingers and wrap them around the ceramic mug, warmth bleeding into his palms.

"Better?" he asks, when Clint has gotten a few good gulps down the hatch; cheap, sweet Campbell's tomato the best thing he's ever tasted in his life. 

Who knew they even had Campbell's in London.

"Better," he rasps, throat hoarse. "Thanks Boss."

This time It's Coulson's turn to frown.

"Phil," he says after a minute, and Clint feels his heart kick up. "Like this... Phil."

"Thanks Phil," he concedes, and Coulson, _Phil,_ nods, just once, sharp and perfunctory, but ruins the impression with his next promise - Always.

"Although," he says snarkily as he gets to his feet, taking Clint's now-empty mug with him, "You wouldn't have to thank me so often if you'd quit jumping off of buildings."

Clint scowls, lists sideways as his head gives an unhappy thump.

"Made the shot," he huffs, exhaustion rushing back in on him now that his belly's full.

"You always do," Phil replies quietly. "I just wish you'd be more careful. You're not replaceable Clint."

"Need a parachute arrow," he mumbles, hunkering down into the plush cushions beneath him, ignoring the feelings that sentiment brings bubbling up. "Tha'd be cool."

Phil just shakes his head, picks up his tablet and moves toward the nearby armchair.

"Grappling arrow," he mutters to himself.

Clint purrs – he knows that tone, that's his _planning tone_ – and snuggles deeper into his blankets as sleep threatens at the edges of his consciousness.

"Gah, your perfect," he slurs happily, his eyes fluttering shut. "You should marry me."

Near his feet he hears Phil chuckle.

"Pipe down Specialist," he says firmly. "You have a fever. Sleep it off."

"Kay," Clint mumbles, and then he does just that. 

**V.**

They're friends now.

Clint's made Level Five, and apparently that's Senior enough that Phil feels like he can relax his non-fraternization rules.

It _is_ Phil too – not Coulson – at least not at work. There it's still formal, still Boss or Sir, but it's fine because he's very nearly the only one that Clint affords the honorific, the respect.

In his office though, when Clint's sacked out on his couch, or in one of the many diners or Chinese restaurants they've started frequenting, it's always Clint and Phil.

It's cool that they get to hang out. As much as Clint has a hardcore crush (unrequited love) on his handler, they _are_ friends too. He's gotten to know more about Phil than maybe anyone does outside of Jasper Sitwell, Melinda May, and of course Nick Fury himself. In return Phil has learned things about Clint that he's not really told anyone before. They practice on the range together, grab take out on the way to and from missions, set up training regimes for the juniors and run ops like clockwork, and it's great.

Now it's the weekend and they're both on two days stand-down after a crazy three weeks of busting their tails over five different missions, and Clint's full of the jittery energy that hits him hard when he can't quite come down from the job as well as he normally does. Phil just shakes his head at him, jerks his head in a familiar _follow-me_ gesture, and drives them over to a neat little walk-up on the nicer side of town.

Phil leads him inside and he's halfway into the living room, his boots by the door and his jacket on the hook before he realizes that he's inside Phil's apartment.

His home.

Clint's a little... a little bit stunned to be honest.

It's... humbling somehow to know Phil trusts him this much, _likes_ him enough to bring him into his safe space on his day off, let him hang around.

He shakes himself out of his weird little epiphany funk in time to keep Phil from really noticing it. He's sticking his gun into a little hidden drawer in the table in the entryway, shucking his suit jacket and rolling up his shirtsleeves, which is a surefire way to set Clint drooling.

"Go pick a movie," he suggests, heading toward the kitchen. "Snoop around. I know you're dying to."

"Gotta check those sightlines Boss," he says with a grin, and Phil chuckles, because they both know that's not what he's going to do.

At least, not _all_ he's going to do...

Wandering into the living room, he does a quick scan of entries and exits, windows and doors and furniture set-up. It's all good – neat, clean – but then it's Phil Coulson so of course it is. It barely takes him a glance to read all that. Then he can get to the more interesting bits.

Comfy furniture - a couch that matches exactly the one in his office at HQ, two fat, fluffy armchairs in the same color. Coffee table stacked with paperwork and pens on one end, a novel, remote control, and coasters on the other. Huge flatscreen television opposite the couch, flanked by shelves of DVD's. A Captain America poster on the wall near the bottom of the stairs.

A grin breaks across Clint's face – god this man.

How does anybody fall for the white-bread office-agent mask he puts on?

After perusing the titles of the books stuffed into the short little shelf below a window, trailing his fingers along the glossy, dark green leaves of the plants potted on top, he moves across the room and sinks down cross-legged onto the floor in front of the DVD cases. Phil's got all three seasons of Dog Cops, a bunch of super hero flicks, some indie movies and a whole rack of cheap action films from the eighties, and Clint can't help the swell of hot, tight love in his chest.

There's a copy of The Princess Bride currently in the DVD player.

"Find something?"

Clint looks up, finds Phil coming in with two bowls of popcorn stacked in his arms, a six pack in one hand. Flashing the empty case at him, he grins and shakes his head.

"Oh my god, marry me you dork."

Phil just laughs, pitches a handful of popcorn at his head.

"Shut up." 

**VI.**

Budapest was an unmitigated disaster.

It couldn't have possibly gone worse.

It goes down as one of the most FUBAR ops in SHIELD history, and it's basically all Clint's fault.

To be fair he doesn't plan it. He has every intention of taking out his target, but then the Black Widow walks right across his sightlines like she's asking for an arrow in the back and he just can't do it. He's seen that look on men's faces before, has worn that look, and he knows she's worth more than that.

So he does the one thing he promised himself he'd never do – he fucks over Coulson by turning off his comm, cutting out his tracker, grabbing the girl, and going rogue.

She's remarkably easy to sway, but then, Clint isn't surprised. He's been where she's at – bruised, broken betrayed, unable to remember the last time she'd really eaten or slept. She lets him lead her to one of his old bolt-holes, still functional even after all his years in SHEILD, follows him in like a lamb to the slaughter, and he knows she only lets him feed her because she thinks he'll poison her, only falls asleep on the bed with him sitting on the floor across the room because she doesn't care if he kills her in her sleep.

When she wakes up sometime just before dawn the next morning, she looks surprised that she did.

When she catches sight of Clint hunched up against the wall in the exact same position he'd been in when she'd fallen asleep, she looks wary.

He knows she doesn't understand, so he shows her where the shower and the towels are and leaves.

He's nervous when he trots up to the corner store, not only because he isn't sure if she'll be there when he gets back. He's half expecting the little red dot of a sniper's laser to appear on his chest at any moment, and that thought, that worry doesn't hurt half as much as thinking about Coulson does.

Picking up eggs, milk, and a carton of fresh blueberries, he jogs back up to the apartment and is only a little bit relieved to hear the sound of water running when he steps inside. He decides to just roll with it – because this is totally normal right? – and starts making breakfast, absolutely does not jump when he turns around to place the first pancake on a plate and finds a young, pale, stone-faced Black Widow sitting at the island behind him.

She doesn't say a word as he stacks the pancakes high before her, pushes a tiny jug of maple syrup across the counter, and Clint thanks his gods that he'd left a bag of coffee grounds in the freezer because brewing a cup or eight keeps his hands even busier, the caffeine keeping him focused. He's never been one to let a silence stand though, and before he even knows he's going to he starts to chatter, to ramble, narrating his entire life for her for no reason at all, until suddenly he's run out of words and the sun is coming in high and bright through the windows, and she's looking at him like she can see right through him.

"You trust him, this Coulson?" she asks, and her words are icy with a thick, Russian accent. 

"Yeah," he says, tracing the rim of his mug with his finger, fear and guilt sitting heavy on his shoulders. "Yeah, I... I do."

She studies him for a moment longer, nods once and picks up her plate, carrying it to the sink and starting the hot water.

"I think I will meet this man," she says, and it's as good an opening as he's going to get so he takes it.

His safehouse still has a goddamn land line so he phones in to Phil's private extension, using his SHIELD code to bypass the automated run-around they give civilians, his heart trying to crawl up out of his throat as the phone rings once, twice, three times.

"Coulson."

Clint flinches, a reaction Natasha definitely sees, horrified by how cold and clipped and sharp Coulson sounds.

He did that, and he can hardly bear that fact.

"Hey Boss," he says quietly, and he's never felt so sheepish, like a puppy that's dirtied the carpet. "Think SHEILD can handle bringing a couple of rogue operatives in out of the cold?"

It's code, lets Phil know that Clint knows he's in trouble, but that both he _and_ Natasha want to come in. He doesn't know what he expects beyond that, beyond the delivery and receipt of that message, but it's certainly not what happens next.

He and Natasha head out to meet Coulson – _just_ Coulson – at a nearby rendezvous point, but the crime syndicate that had been after Natasha in the first place caught up with them, and they'd ended up having to take them down on the way there. Unfortunately, they take about half the city down right along with it.

Budapest will never be the same.

Neither will Clint's appendix.

He ends up taking a shot to the gut, and all he really remembers after that is lying flat on his back on the floor of a quinjet with Coulson and Natasha both leaning over him, two sets of hands keeping him together, and all he can see is the deep blue of Coulson's eyes, the bright red of Nat's hair and his own blood. Then someone presses down and pain flares across his abdomen and he passes out into the blessed dark.

He comes to later in a SHEILD hospital bed, though it takes him a while to figure that out. He's on the good drugs, like, the _really_ good drugs, the ones that make everything funny and fuzzy around the edges, and he swears he can hear Nat's voice somewhere nearby, Phil's too.

And it is Phil's – he knows that somehow. It's... softer, not as hurt, and god he hopes that's real, not just the fevered begging of his imagination.

"… can't say I approve of his methods," Phil says, as Clint's ears decide to get with the program and start paying attention again. "But I _am_ glad you were there Natasha."

Clint feels a stupid, druggy smile tug at the edges of his mouth.

He'd called her _Natasha_ – that could only mean they were friends right?

He knew they would be.

"He's very convincing," she finally replies, "Even though he wasn't really trying to be. He says you are a good man."

"The best," Clint hums, grinning stupidly now as he blinks his eyes open, his voice hoarse and scratchy. The ceiling is doing loop-the-loops and he can't really focus, but he feels safe again and that's all that matters.

"We're gonna get married!" he sing-songs, and Coulson makes a fond scoffing sound, appearing at Clint's bedside and lifting the cup and bendy straw to his lips, water blessedly cool.

"Clint, you're high," he says reprovingly, but he thinks he pets Clint's hair just the same. "You lost your appendix and more blood than any one man should lose. Try to at least pretend to take it easy."

"Yessir," he slurs, trying and failing not to giggle as his eyes immediately start to flutter closed again.

As he drifts off he hears Coulson sit back down beside the bed, hears the familiar rustle of paperwork in his hands.

"I assure you Miss Romanov, there are absolutely no forced relationships here at SHIELD between handlers and assets. If anyone should ever pressure you, I hope you'll feel comfortable approaching me as you supervising officer..."

**VII.**

Strike Team Delta is quite possibly the coolest thing that Clint has ever been a part of, and he grew up in a circus.

Natasha integrates into their little group quickly and seamlessly, and together the three of them become the best team SHIELD has ever had. Budapest becomes a dirty word that no other agent dares utter when one of them is within hearing range, and the trust and faith they put in each other is unbreakable, afforded to no one else. They're ruthless, effective, and given a lot of leeway because they get things done.

Leeway like an extra two days in Venice after their op, two days of downtime in a beautiful city before their extraction.

They've just left their apartment and are walking along the river toward the open-air market, Natasha's arm wound through the crook of Coulson's elbow as Clint waltzes along the cobblestones on his other side. They've each got one of his famous coconut-pineapple scones in their hands, still warm, running with sweet butter – his contribution to breakfast – and are licking the glaze from their fingers as they walk.

Clint is absolutely, one hundred percent, _not_ staring.

"These are amazing Phil," Natasha hums, breaking off a piece and popping it demurely into her mouth. "How do you do it?"

"Don't even bother," Clint grumbles good-naturedly. "SHIELD's been trying to get that recipe out of him for years."

"Coulson family secret," the man himself says with a shitty little smirk, because he knows, he knows how much subterfuge surrounds that stupid recipe back at HQ.

"One more reason you should marry me," Clint says, savoring his last bite and dusting off his hands. 

"Shouldn't it be the other way around?" Natasha purrs, and Clint leans forward to glare at her around Coulson's chest. She knows by now – she'd know even if Clint hadn't completely spilled the beans to her on more than one occasion – and she takes great pleasure in pushing him toward making a confession he's too scared to make. "One more reason in a _million reasons_ why _you_ should marry _him?_ What do you say Coulson – make our boy an honest man?"

"Absolutely not Agent Romanoff," Phil replies, all mock sternness, but Clint's heart drops a little all the same until Coulson continues. "My mother would never forgive me. A spring wedding she said, June fifth at the latest."

"Hmm," Nat murmurs, dropping his arm to skip forward a few steps as they near the bustling market, turning around to shoot them both a significant look. "Too bad Clint. Guess you'll have to wait till next year."

**IIX.**

"Marry me."

Clint's lost track of how many times he's said that, how many times he's suggested the idea, but this is the first time that he's demanded it so heatedly, and if he's honest with himself he doesn't even know what he expects anymore. He's stopped thinking that Coulson will actually ever say yes, that he would ever even think that Clint is serious, but when the man had walked into their hotel room, soaking wet and bright-eyed, something inside of him snaps and he tosses him back against the door by his lapels.

"Marry me," he says again, his fingers locked tight in Phil's shirt front.

They're both cold, clammy, their clothes sticking to them after being out in the rain and mud, and Clint's got so many things swimming around in his blood, in his head that Phil Coulson is the only real thing he's sure of any more.

"It's gods and aliens now Boss," he chokes, his eyes on Coulson's lips because he can't bring himself to meet the man's gaze. He'd followed Phil down to New Mexico on Fury's orders, stopped at a gas station covered in flour and made it to the site of an 0-8-4 just in time to jump into a lift bucket with his bow in his hand. "It's gods and hammers and fucking _myth_ and just, just... _marry me."_

Coulson is staring at him, licks his lips, and Clint blinks, drops him and takes a step back because he's abruptly realized that he's pressing in close, keeping the man pinned against the door and he's not getting any response and oh hell, what has he...

"How about dinner?"

Clint's heart trips, his breath catching in his throat.

"Wh... what?"

"Dinner," Coulson says again, swallowing hard. "I just, I thought... when this is over. When we get back. Can I take you to dinner?"

"Really?" Clint bleats, and christ _shut up Barton,_ what are you doing, just shut up!

"It's gods and aliens now Clint," he says back, standing up and straightening his jacket. "I have to go back out there and talk to a man who's not a man at all, who's going to change _everything_ and... and I don't want this to change. I don't want us to change. So have dinner with me."

"Yeah," he breathes, before he even knows he's going to answer him, but what else could he possibly say? "Yeah, yes, please."

"Ok then," Phil says, a grin slowly breaking across his face, and he sounds just as surprised as Clint, just as delighted. "Dinner."

"Dinner," Clint agrees, and they smile stupidly at each other for a minute before Phil pulls his _Agent Coulson_ back together and nods, straightens his tie and slips back out the door.

Clint flumps onto his starchy single bed, stares goofily at the ceiling as happiness swells inside his chest like music, and laughs his ass off when Phil comes back in two minutes later to get the files he was after in the first place.

**IX.**

He doesn't mean to do it.

Well, he _does,_ just... not like this?

He's just imagined it so many times, so many ways that it kinda takes him by surprise.

Phil had picked him up in Lola earlier that afternoon and driven them to Clint's favorite burger joint before heading to a putt-putt golf course themed with dinosaurs and day-glo paint. As far as first dates go it had been completely unexpected and that kinda makes it perfect. Clint had spent nearly a week freaking out that he wasn't fancy enough to go to a nice restaurant with multiple forks, or a broadway show, or whatever else it as the Phil might be into. Nat had smacked him on the back of the head and told him that he knew Phil better than that, which had only done so much to calm his nerves.

Golf was silly and casual and fun, and came with all the benefits of seeing Phil Coulson in jeans lean over to line up his shot. They'd come out pretty even once Clint had been given his handicap, and had laughed and joked and touched their way through the entire course before heading off in the direction of central park. They'd stopped at a cart for ice cream cones – black cherry for Phil, pistachio and dark chocolate for Clint – and headed up a secluded pathway, free hands bumping as they walked side-by-side.

The sun had been coming through the trees, the day warm and bright, and Clint doesn't mean to but he turns and stares, and when Phil turns back with a questioning look he pulls him in by the back of the neck and kisses him for all he's worth.

It's long and lingering, warm and sweet, far more chaste than he'd ever imagined, but it still makes his heart sing in his chest with how damn _right_ it feels.

Breaking the kiss at last, they lean against each other, foreheads pressed together, Phil's free hand clutching at Clint's hip, and it's everything he's ever wanted them to be.

"Marry me," Clint breathes, and Phil chuckles, his breath puffing against Clint's mouth.

"Wasn't _that_ good a kiss," he teases, pecking another one to his lips, and Clint's fingers tighten against his nape.

"Yes it was," he argues quietly. "Maybe you just need some more convincing."

Phil grins and takes an impossible step closer, pressing them together from knees to chest.

"Maybe I do."

**X.**

Clint is exhausted.

His body aches, his head hurts, and nothing really... _fits_ right after Loki.

Thor had assured him after the battle that all his brother's influence was gone out of his head, but every time he closes his eyes all he can see is a cloudy, consuming blue. He can't blink, can't sleep, can't rest his eyes without seeing it, without feeling that cold, alien emptiness come creeping back in on him, so he doesn't. It's been five days, five days since Tony flew a nuke into outer space, since he and Natasha had teamed up with gods and geniuses and men out of time to battle aliens and monsters and all the things they'd never been prepared for. Five days since New York was nearly destroyed, hundreds of people dead, and yet only one person really matters.

 _'Not true,'_ he thinks as he wriggles his way through a crack in the pile of rubble he's helping to search, presses up with his shoulders to lift a beam. _'Not true.'_

Not the only one who matters, just...

Just the only one who matters to Clint.

The rest of them, the Avengers, they all got through it ok, Hill, Fury...

But there are so many people dead, civilians whose names he doesn't know, SHIELD agents whose blood stains his own hands...

Too many.

It's overwhelming, and yet the only point of pain he can feel, the only _real_ thing that gets through the fog of dull, cobalt-colored guilt is Phil's absence.

Absence, fuck, _death._

Fury'd made it pretty clear that the senior agent had flatlined after being stabbed through the heart by Loki's goddamn scepter. If that hadn't clinched it, tossing down Phil's Captain America trading cards, soaked in blood, had.

Clint doesn't remember much about that night after the cards had hit the table. Doesn't remember much about this past _week._ He thinks Natasha must have gotten him out of the shawarma shop before he'd made a complete mess of himself in public, and no one from SHIELD psych has come to collect him yet so she must be doing some serious damage control.

Not that he would know – he's hardly been back to what Stark is now calling Avengers Tower at all since everything went down.

No, instead he's been out on the streets, volunteering; moving food and clothes, directing the displaced to pop-up shelters, helping to search the rubble for the trapped and the deceased. It's hard work, physical not mental, if only because he shuts his brain down and lets his body take over, going where he's sent, pushing and hauling and lifting when he's told. He's coming to the end of that too though, he can tell, his muscles quivering and shaking, knees threatening to give.

Loki hadn't much cared whether or not his minions had been taken care of. Clint hadn't eaten, hadn't slept the entire time he'd been under, and he hadn't really done that since either. When thirst threatens to make him dizzy, spots swimming in front of his eyes, he swigs down a bottle or two of water, but that's it, that's all.

Keep pushing.

He thinks he's sort of... blacked out when he feels Natasha's hand clamp down on his elbow, feels her drag him away from the sewer drain he's about to climb down into after a mewling kitten. He makes a pathetically weak sound of protest but the other volunteers wave him off, a petite blonde woman already taking his place. The next thing he knows he's being packed into the passenger seat of a black SHIELD SUV and a thermos is being shoved into his hand, and the look on Natasha's face says he better not say a damned word.

It's easy enough to do as he's expected to do. Sit quietly, sip the hot broth inside the thermos slowly, focus on keeping it down as his abused stomach rolls in protest. They make it all the way to Stark Tower, shit, Avengers Tower before the silence is broken, before she speaks.

"Fury has asked to speak to us," she says quietly, and Clint doesn't react, doesn't feel anything because what is the worst that can happen now? "I don't know what he has to say but Clint? Whatever it is? This has to stop."

Now, now his throat gets tight and tears threaten, his eyes stinging and he can't do anything but nod as he stares down at his hands, his bruised and bleeding knuckles. He knows that this is hard for her too, that he wasn't the only one that lost Phil, and a part of him also knows that she's worried about losing him as well. _That_ hurts, _that_ he can feel, so he nods and makes a silent promise that he doesn't know how to keep, but if her hand, gentle and warm on his neck is any judge, she already knows this, is ready and willing to do the dirty work to help.

She gets him into the elevator, up into some sort of conference room and in a seat, where he's slightly less likely to collapse than if he'd been standing against the wall as was his habit. The other Avengers trickle in – Steve and Stark and Banner – everyone but Thor, who Clint isn't sure he's ready to see again anyway, and then, when they're all assembled, Fury. Clint doesn't react to his presence, doesn't feel anything, but then the bastard sets his feet and squares his shoulders and Clint knows something's wrong.

"It seems I was a bit hasty in declaring Agent Coulson dead," he says without preamble, without apology. "Looks like the stubborn bastard's decided to pull through."

Clint can't pick out any words from the explosion of angry shouts around him. It's all too loud, too much. All he can really hear is a rushing sound in his ears, the rapid, frightened thump of his heart like a rabbit's, and then he'd falling, tumbling deep into the dark.

He comes to long enough later that the room has cleared, Fury gone, no one there but Natasha who is sitting on the floor with his head in her lap. They don't speak, not out loud at least, just get to their feet, pick themselves up one more time, and head back down to the parking garage. They climb into the same SUV from before, Natasha in the driver's seat, and he doesn't ask how she knows where to go, doesn't ask what was said in the few moments he'd been lost to consciousness. He just trusts the pained, aching silence between them, the angry, _fearful_ tension.

Walking onto that med floor feels like a nightmare. The one thing he's wanted more than anything else in his life, the one thing it should have been impossible for him to have, lying thin and pale and fragile in a sterile, white hospital bed...

His knees nearly _do_ give out.

Once more Natasha is at his side, holding him up, dragging him to a chair at Phil's bedside and pushing him down into it. She then stands guard over the two of them while he has his breakdown. It takes him a while to work through it, the hiccoughing sobs that wrack his body as his brain fights to remember that it knows how to breathe, that it actually needs the oxygen to keep going. Those ten minutes reduce him to an utter mess, strip him down to the raw nerves and broken heart he's been hiding ever since he found out, but once it's done it's done, and he can go on to more important things.

A nurse comes in while it's still just he and Natasha. She speaks quietly, tells them as much as she can; how, with a bit of experimental tech, Phil's physical condition is rapidly improving. He'd woken up just once, long enough to scream, and then had fallen into the comatose sleep he still lay under. They have yet to try to wake him, instead opting to let his body heal itself in its own time, but anticipate that he should be waking up unassisted within the next few days.

Clint doesn't listen to half of it. He's too busy staring at Phil's face like he's never seen it before, like he'll never see it again. It's astonishing to him that he had nearly lost this man, who means more to him than anyone ever really has, without telling him exactly that. As the Avengers all troop in silently for their turn to stand over Phil's bedside, he trembles with the knowledge of what he had lost, the realizations swimming around in his blood like little metal barbs, prickling. Of course he knows he loves Phil – he'd realized that long ago – but he hadn't realized just how much, how deeply.

When he's finally left alone with the unconscious agent, the lights dimming around them as the private med wing prepares for sleep, he lets go of a breath he's been holding for far too long and reaches out to take Phil's hand.

"Phil, you have to wake up now," he murmurs, his throat hoarse and his voice cracking as tears roll down his face. _"Please._ You have to wake up and marry me."

**AVAVA**

"So when's the wedding?"

It's flippant, teasing, the way Tony can be when you finally get past his prickly shell and become his friend, but Clint still chokes on his coffee, only just keeping himself from spraying a mouthful all over the kitchen counter.

The genius cocks an eyebrow at him, then flicks a pointed glance at Phil, who's sitting across island calmly reading the paper. He hadn't even looked up when Tony had made his smart-assed remark, hadn't even rattled the pages of the sports section as he turned them, while Clint's heart has very nearly come leaping up out of his chest.

He should respond, he knows, should huff out some stupid, cocky remark but he can feel his cheeks burning as he blushes and Tony's no idiot, despite how he tries to be sometimes. There's no way he hasn't put some things together in the last six months, since Phil had been released from the hospital and made the Avengers' official liaison to SHIELD and the public media. He doesn't think there's anything he can say that won't put the genius on the scent, so he just hunches his shoulders and ducks his head, stares down into the depths of his coffee mug.

He gets why Tony thinks what he thinks ok? These past year... he's come a long way in his relationship with Phil.

God, had it really only been a year since Thor, since they'd gone on that first date, shared their first kiss?

They've been moving slow since, due largely in part to Phil's continued convalescence. There's still not much they can get up to beyond kisses, and Clint's mostly kept those behind closed doors. They're too soft, too sweet, too intimate to be flaunted all over the Tower, and maybe that's silly but after Phil being his and Nat's for so many years he's still learning how to share.

Still, he's devoted the last six months to making Phil as comfortable as possible, to wandering around at his heels like a puppy after his master. That's nothing new – _Coulson's Bitch_ remember? - but for the other members of the team it must be... surprising. 

Stark doesn't know that Clint's in love with their resident agent.

He doesn't know that Clint's proposed to him before, lots of times.

He just sees Clint constantly fawning over him, hovering over him, mooning after him with hearts in his eyes, and this is him needling him for a laugh, just like he always does.

Only...

"We haven't set a date yet," Phil replies, taking a sip of his own coffee and picking up his pen to have a go at the crossword.

Clint feels his jaw drop and he's staring, watching for the smallest tell, and you could hear a pin drop in that kitchen but Phil doesn't even react, like it's the most normal thing in the world to say, like it makes perfect sense even though Clint's heart is very suddenly trying to pound its way out of his chest.

Tony looks back and forth between them several times, his eyebrows making a break for his hairline, before suddenly he tilts his head and his whole body relaxes, the way it does when he's finally solved a problem.

"Huh," he murmurs, and then he's picking up his gross, green smoothie, patting Clint firmly on the cheek, and walking out.

Silence.

The hard, painful thump of his heart.

One. Two. Three...

"Phil?"

It's a whimper, a croak, broken and wavering, and Phil immediately looks up, concern written all over his face.

"Clint?"

Clint shakes his head, he _can't,_ and Phil gets up and rounds the counter, crosses to his side to take Clint's face into his hands.

"Phil, you didn't mean..."

"Do you know how many times you've asked me to marry you?" he murmurs, his thumbs sweeping over Clint's cheeks where his eyes have gone damp, as nerves make him try to pull away. "Ten Clint. Ten times in thirteen years."

"I didn't..." he scrambles, "I wasn't..."

Because he _hadn't._ He hadn't ever thought that Phil would take him seriously, not even when they'd finally gone on that very first date, when suddenly he'd had a chance at what he'd wanted for a very long time.

"Maybe not at first," Phil allows, letting him go so that Clint can pull back just a little, get some distance so he can _see,_ so he can _understand._ "Maybe not at first but I think... I think you _did_ start to mean it. A long, long time ago."

And well it just sounds so unsure, sounds so much like a question that he can't let the uncertainty stand.

"I... yeah," he says, swallowing hard and nodding. "Right around London, when I fell into the river..."

"When you _jumped_ into the river you mean."

Clint scowls, crosses his arms and looks away.

"I didn't..." he starts, not sure now what to say. "I mean I shouldn't have... It's just you never _said."_

It comes out louder than he means it to, frustration coming through even though it's unfair.

"Neither did you, not really," Phil scolds gently. "I wasn't sure, and then I died, and... well. I was thinking now, this time... maybe I could beat you to the punch."

Clint's heart gives one great thump, then stutters, starts again and tries to run away on him.

Phil takes a step back, puts one hand into his pocket and another onto the counter, and Clint promptly panics, slipping off his stool and pressing his hands to the man's shoulders, careful, so careful of his chest as he forces him to stay on his feet.

"Coulson don't... stop, _stop._ Just... wait."

"Clint?"

"Just," he chokes, tears seriously threatening him now as his hands start to shake. "Don't... If you ask me what I think you're gonna ask me, I'm gonna say yes. I can't... I can't _not_ say yes. So don't..."

It comes out in a rush, pleading, desperate, and he's _terrified_ of what's happening right now, but Phil just smiles softly at him, cups his cheek and presses a kiss to his forehead.

"In that case," he murmurs quietly, and then he's slowly sinking down onto one knee, pulling a ring box out of his pocket, and Clint can't breathe.

"I love you Clint Barton," Phil says simply, as if it's the easiest truth in the world. "I've loved you for... a long, long time. You know me better than anyone, and you, you're... you're perfect. I don't know how I got so lucky that you came into my life, but you did and you stayed and you _kept asking,_ and... and now I can't _not_ ask _you."_

Blinking, Phil drops his gaze, glances around as though he's just realized what he's doing, his fingers tapping against the velvet ring box in his hand.

"To be fair this wasn't how I'd planned to ask. Not in _Stark's kitchen..."_

"Phil?" Clint warbles, "Shut up and ask me. Please?"

Phil grins, an expression warmer than Clint thinks he's ever seen on the man's face before.

"Clint Barton," he says seriously, opening the ring box to reveal a gleaming silver ring, inlaid with a narrow band of purple so dark it's nearly black, "Will you marry me?"

Clint's helpless nod and enthusiastic kiss is all the answer either of them need.


End file.
